Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not blame the Leas-Cheann Comhairle because I will be naming them and I will be making allegations I can stand over - every single one of them. One of them is that Mr. Gorman was treated differently from the CEO. When a disclosure was made to the Department, Mr. Gorman was suspended. Why was the CEO not suspended when allegations were made about him?

To be fair to Mr. Gorman, he did nothing wrong and he won his case at the Workplace Relations Commission and won a substantial amount of money. He will be going further and will go to the courts. Maybe when we get to the courts, we will actually find out the truth, as in the case of Mr. Bates and the Post Office in England. For 20 years, the public service, the Civil Service and all of them came together to do that to this man. It was wrong. I wish the Minister were here tonight because I want to put everything about this on the record of the Dáil. A good man's name has been damaged by somebody who should not have done it. This is a man who gave 37.5 years of good service to the State. It is wrong, and when somebody is wronged, that has to be put right.

I will not let this go. As for the excuse that it has gone to the Garda for investigation, the Minister of State and I know the Garda could spend the next ten years investigating that, and it will be investigating the CEO as well. I hope the Garda does that and quickly. He has already won his case at the Workplace Relations Commission, an independent body that has also made damning findings. It is a pity the Department did not put some of the damning findings into the script tonight.

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